


What a Day

by mackenziemchale



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Love, Post S3, Post Series, Romance, a lil bit of angst, pregnant mac
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:22:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24069571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mackenziemchale/pseuds/mackenziemchale
Summary: Her brows raise in surprise as she sees Will and Charlie in his arms “did I miss out on the memo that it’s bring your daughter to work day?
Relationships: Will McAvoy/MacKenzie McHale
Comments: 8
Kudos: 15





	What a Day

Will rubs his forehead as an exasperated sigh comes from him while reading an email from Reese, he wanted everyone in the newsroom to upgrade to IPhones which would be paid for and provided by AWM.

He was glad that he was able to kick Pruitt to the curb the second the opportunity arose, but that didn’t mean he and Mackenzie weren’t going head to head daily with Reese. Will really didn’t want to trade out his Blackberry for an IPhone, he already didn’t understand technology as is.

(He still couldn’t believe he had a blog and he had absolutely no idea how to find it)

Will had a feeling he was going to lose this fight. He’d have to give in to Reese on this one and bite the bullet no matter how much he didn’t want to.

Though they still fought Reese daily they at least didn’t have to deal with Leona too, especially not after Mackenzie gave birth to their beautiful baby girl two years ago. They rarely fought with Leona since she insisted on basically being Charlie’s grandmother. Will protested when he first found out she wanted that, but somewhere along the way he gave up and let Leona be part of their daughter’s life. It didn’t seem like Reese was going to give her a grandchild at any point anyway. To his surprise, Charlie actually did love Leona and even referred to her as “ona”, it was quite adorable.

Besides Reese inflicting a headache upon Will, his day wasn’t actually half bad. It was somewhat slow, but he had lunch with Mac to look forward to which always made his day better. They usually tried to have lunch together everyday unless something conflicted. It was one of the ways they spent time alone that wasn’t because of something work related.

As Will sits back in his chair, his Blackberry begins to ring on his desk. Reaching out, he notices that it was their babysitter Natalie. They had hired her to take care of Charlie almost everyday while they worked. Some days Mackenzie’s parents would come into the city and watch over her and sometimes Leona would too. Most days though it was Natalie.

“Hello?”

“Hi Mr. McAvoy-”

“Natalie we’ve been over this, please call me Will.”

She pauses for a beat before carrying on, “right, sorry, Will. I was just calling to let you know that I can’t stay with Charlie all day. I’m sorry to do this to you. I know you and Mrs. Mc- Mackenzie are busy all day, but there’s a family emergency and I need to leave as soon as possible.”

Shit. He had their first rundown meeting in twenty minutes and he was pretty sure no one was available to watch Charlie for the day.

“Don’t apologize, family is important. I’ll call for my car and be there as soon as possible. Do you need anything? Money for a cab? And don’t worry, we’ll still pay you for the day” Will replies as he stands up from his desk and grabs his jacket, making his way out of his office quickly.

“Oh no, no, I couldn’t ask that of you, either of those.”

“It’s fine, you work hard and Charlotte loves you. You deserve it” he insists. He wasn’t about to take away her pay when she most likely needed it more than he did. They’d be fine finically.

Their phone call ends shortly after and Will makes a call for his car as he waits for the elevator. He’d have to make calls and see if anyone else was available to watch Charlie, but he was pretty sure no one was. He’d never brought her to the newsroom before and neither had Mac so this was certainly going to be interesting.

⠀⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀⠀●●●⠀ ⠀ ⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀ ⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀  ⠀⠀⠀

It was twenty minutes later before Will made it back to the newsroom. He was late to the rundown meeting but it wasn’t like they couldn’t do it without him for at least five to ten minutes. 

He walks into the rundown meeting as Jim is talking by the white board, holding one of his hands was Charlie. She curiously looks around the room as Will walks over to his seat and places the two year old in his lap.

That immediately distracts Tamara, Kendra, and Tess and they all move toward Will to say hi to Charlie. 

“Guys…” Will protests but the women don’t listen, they continue cooing and tickling Charlie, making her giggle.

This disrupts the meeting and Jim trails off his words, giving a ‘really?’ look to Will as he realizes what was going on. 

“Alright alright, girls I promise that you can spend some time with Charlie in a little while but we should focus” Will insists, not wanting to derail the meeting any further.

The three women listen to him and break away from him and Charlotte, letting Jim carry on with the meeting. 

Throughout the meeting everyone was focused on the stories, pitching what was important and figuring out what could be fit into their lineup for the night. 

As they’re chatting, Charlie makes sounds and little movements here and there. It ranged between giggles, reaching for Will’s pen as he wrote, and small sneezes. All things that made the women stop for a moment to say “aweee” or “she’s so cute”.

Will was currently playing with her tiny hands in his much bigger ones. As he’s keeping her entertained while listening to Jim, Charlotte lets out a squeal that interrupts him again. 

“Sorry” he apologizes before Jim can say anything. 

Instead of doing so, he just carries on with the meeting. They were almost done anyway, besides she was just two years old after all, she didn’t know any better. 

As the meeting comes to an end and Will begins to get up, he notices Mackenzie coming into the room. He smiles to himself as he watches her walk in. She was glowing, from her pregnancy of course, and was showing just a small amount. She was only three months along.

Mac wasn’t looking at Will just yet, “how are things looking so far?” she asks Jim.

“So far so good, of course it’s just the first meeting so nothing is completely set in stone. Though we had quite the meeting because of a little guest” he nods over in Will’s direction.

Will walks over with Charlie in his arms and smiles as Mac looks in their direction, “hi honey.”

Her brows raise in surprise as she sees Will and Charlie in his arms “did I miss out on the memo that it’s bring your daughter to work day?

Charlotte waves happily at her mom, “hi mommy!” she cheers.

Mac’s gaze moves down to their daughter and she presses a kiss to her head, “hi sweet pea” she says with a smile.

He watches with a smile, “no actually Natalie had to leave this morning, family emergency. Your parents are currently across the pond, my siblings live out of state, Leona is… well I’m not sure but she’s probably drunk or high, that leaves Jim and Maggie and Sloan and Don and they’re all working. So I picked her up, grabbed everything I figured she needed, and here we are.”

She looks back up at him, “did you bring pull ups?”

“Of course.”

“Snacks?”

Mac automatically wanted to go through a checklist with him since he had a habit of forgetting things for Charlie whenever they went out. It was never anything too big, but still things she wanted like her little stuffed Paddington Bear (which of course Mac picked out for her) or her favorite blanket.

“Yes I’ve got it all, even the sippy cup she loves to drink from.”

“And her blanket? What about the stuffed Paddington Bear she loves to sleep with?”

Will nods and turns his wife toward the door so they could head to lunch together. He slides an arm around her once they’re out of the room, “don’t worry, I’ve got everything we need for the whole day, including Paddington Bear.”

Mac glances down at his side and then over at his other, “uh Billy?”

“Hmm?”

“If you have everything then where’s the essentials bag?”

Will looks down at his sides and realizes he left the bag in his office, “shit!”

“Billy!” Mac exclaims and slaps his arm as they begin walking toward his office instead of the elevators.

“Ow!” He exclaims then rubs the side of his arm as he leads into his office. 

“I’ve told you about a thousand times not to curse in front of our daughter.”

“Darling she’s two, she’s never gonna remember it.”

Mac gives him the ‘don’t you even try, McAvoy’ look, “I don’t care, you need to get out of the habit of cursing in front of her now before she says it when she’s not supposed to and gets in trouble.”

Will knew not to argue when he was given  _ that look _ so he bites his tongue and nods, she was right anyway. There was no use in letting their daughter get in trouble in the future for teaching her a bad word.

He grabs the essentials bag from beside his desk along with the stroller then turns to Mac again, “so what are we doing for lunch? It might be easier to stay here.”

“No, no, I’ve been in my office all morning and I’m tired of it. We’ll find a simple little cafe and if we have time I say we go for a walk in the park.”

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Mac rests her head down on Will’s shoulder, holding onto his arm as he pushes Charlotte in her stroller through the park. It was a gorgeous day out, the sun was beaming down on them and there were only a few clouds in the sky. It was a beautiful spring day in New York City.

“So, who’s gonna take care of Charlie during the show?” Mac questions.

“Well I don’t think it would be the best idea if she was in the control room, she’d probably put ‘Vertigo Medicine with Will McAvoy’ on the intro again. Oh no wait that was you” he jokes.

“I only did that because you were being a stubborn ass by refusing to listen to me.”

“Okay okay I guess I deserved that, I’m just glad we didn’t broadcast it.”

“You know now that I think about it, I really should’ve. It would’ve taught you a lesson” Mac jokes this time.

“Hey!” He protests.

She laughs, “seriously though, who should watch Charlie tonight?”

“Why not Sloan? She and Don usually do a pretty good job whenever we ask to watch. Besides, it’ll be good practice if they ever have kids.”

Mac nods, “okay, I think that’ll be fine. Charlie loves Sloan.”

Sometime during their walk, Mac brings them over to a picnic table and takes a seat, her feet feeling sore. Her back was killing her too, “your sister or brother has really got it out for mummy today” she says as she looks down at Charlie who had fallen asleep in her stroller.

Will on the other hand had gone over to the man selling ice cream out of a cart to buy some for them and bottled water. 

As she’s trading off between watching him and Charlie, she notices out of the corner of her eye a familiar face beginning to walk in her direction. Please oh please let it be her mind playing trick on her, don’t let it be  _ him _ .

Mackenzie unfortunately confirms her suspicions when she turns her head. Right away she felt her stomach turn over and begin to make her feel ill. It was none other than Brian Brenner. Of course it was, why would she and Will have a lunch date with their daughter in peace? Something always had to step in the way. In this case it just  _ had  _ to be Brian Brenner of all people.

“Well well well, fancy meeting you here” he says with a smug look on his face.

“We are at a park…” she trials off. Then again, New York City’s population was nearing the nine million mark but of course of all of those people she had to see Brian again. 

Meanwhile, Will was just turning away from the cart and making way back over to her. The instant he notices that it was Brian talking to her, he almost crushes one of the ice cream cups in his hand.

That sends ice cream running down his hand, “ah great” he complains, not being able to do anything about it since he was holding two cups of ice cream in both of his hands and a water bottle under his arm. 

Mac was just telling Brian who Charlotte was (who had just woken up from her nap) when Will makes it over to them.

“Two cups of ice cream and a bottle of water for my beautiful wife and daughter” he smiles at her, completely ignoring Brian.

“Oh honey you’ve made a mess” Mac says and grabs a wet wipe from Charlie’s essentials bag.

“Sorry, I squeezed our ice cream cup a little too hard” Will apologizes as she cleans the ice cream off his hand. She places both cups aside for the time being, knowing Brian couldn’t be around for much longer. At least she hoped not.

Mac finally acknowledges him again, “Brain you remember by husband of course, Will.” She was fully aware that sounded as if Will wasn’t the face of ACN and very well known across the nation especially in New York City. 

“Of course I remember him, I did write a piece on him after all” Brian acknowledges. 

She could see the anger and resentment flash briefly over Will’s face just before Brian turns to shake hands with him. It was a short and quick greeting before Will sits down next to Mac and begins giving Charlie a little bit of the ice cream. 

(She had already eaten a good lunch earlier while at the cafe with them and Will figured a little treat would be okay. Sweets weren’t something that Charlie had all the time, Mac was somewhat strict about that)

“Right…” Mac didn’t know what to say next. She wasn’t about to ask how he was doing or say that it was nice to see him when she didn’t care and didn’t like him. 

“Sorry did you say you two were married? That’s your daughter?” He questions. 

She looks over at Will, who was doing everything in his power to just ignore Brian and entertain their daughter who was happily enjoying her treat and had no idea what was going on. A small smile comes to her face, she loved her little family.

A hand instinctively comes to her stomach and she turns to Brian, “and we’re expecting in September” Mac nods. They hadn’t really told a lot of people about her pregnancy yet, she was only three months along but she just had the urge to show him that she was truly happy. That and show him what he missed out on.

“Interesting… I just figured since you know the whole cheating on him with me thing, you two would never be together again.”

Mac could barely get “Will” out of her mouth before he was standing in front of her, holding Brian by the collar. 

“Don’t you even dare talk to her like that, you hear me?”

“Careful McAvoy, you’re a public figure and I’m a journalist. I can see the headlines now, ‘Crazed Will McAvoy Beats Up Innocent Journalist’” Brian sneers.

Will pushes him back as he lets go of his grasp, “innocent my ass.”

Brian just gives him a smirk and begins to walk away, “you stay the hell away from my wife and my family you prick” Will demands.

When he turns around again, Mac had gathered up their things and was placing the ice cream in the trash. “Let’s go back to work” she insists and grabs hold of Charlotte’s stroller.

Mac was visibly upset, but puts up a hand and starts to walk when he tries to comfort her. “Not now, our break ended five minutes ago and we need to go back.”

Will doesn’t utter another word, he just follows behind her as they go for the car waiting for them on the street to take them back to the newsroom.

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Will opens the door to their apartment hours later, pushing Charlie’s stroller into the apartment and walking in with her.

He turns back to his wife who had just followed in behind him, carrying Charlie’s diaper bag. It was obvious by the exhaustion written on her face that she wasn’t up for a chat right now.

Even though Will wanted to talk about the events that happened earlier because he had barely seen her since their outing, he knew that it was best to wait until later. Possibly even tomorrow if she wasn’t up for it tonight.

Besides the awful run in with Brian, having Charlie with him for most of the day actually made it that much more enjoyable. She stayed with Mac during rundown meetings and for at least an hour each time so that they both got a chance to spend time with her. Even though Charlie definitely loved to make her presence known by wreaking a little havoc around the office, (she had run off with some of Mac’s paperwork and ran all around the bullpen with it until Will caught her) it was refreshing to have her around. Tamara, Kendra, and Tess certainly loved spending a little while with her and so did Sloan while Will did the show.

Will steps behind Mackenzie and helps her slide out of her coat, taking it and placing it on the coat rack by the door. Turning back, she greets him with a tired but loving smile. 

He reaches out and brushes a piece of hair from her face then presses a gentle kiss to her forehead. Smiling as he pulls back, Mackenzie takes his hand and gives it a squeeze before he steps away to take care of Charlie.

They had this unspoken communication, it was as if they could read each other’s mind. Will knew it had been a long day for Mac meaning she was probably going to go de-stress by taking a shower and settling into bed with one of his shirts. She said she loved wearing his shirts whenever she could because they smelled of him and that comforted her.

Will picks up Charlie in his arms and begins carrying off to her room, she hadn’t fallen asleep yet and that was something he needed to take care of before he could join Mac.

Mackenzie meanwhile steps out of her shoes with a sigh, carrying them with her as she walks to their bedroom. Not only was her body aching everywhere from the pregnancy, but her mood had been in the toilet since their run in with Brian.

She expected him to be an arrogant asshole because that’s who he was at the core, but to bring up the biggest mistake of her life right then and there? That was a new low. Maybe she shouldn’t have been surprised, he did after all write incredibly ridiculous things about Will in that piece he did.

Having all of these old feelings be brought up like that made her want to press a restart button on the day and start over again. Mac had to admit that she was surprised Will wasn’t in a similar boat as her, he was the victim in that situation.

As she’s slowly getting ready to take her shower, she hears a voice coming from the baby monitor next to their bed and curiously walks over to it, reminded that she could hear and see Will on the other side.

“You know Charlie, it’s a good thing you got pretty much all of your mom’s looks. Except for my eyes which isn’t so bad.”

Mac shakes her head and watches as he puts Charlie, who he had changed into her pajamas, into her bed. He gets her tucked in and stays with her a little longer. She looked somewhat tired, but not ready to sleep.

“Daddy, I no want seep” she complains.

He smiles a little, “but sleep is good for you princess, it helps you grow.”

Charlie shakes her head and throws the covers off of herself, “I no seep.”

Will only chuckles and covers their daughter up again with the blankets, “I think I know something that might just persuade you.”

Soon enough and Will was singing a soft lullaby to Charlie. It was one that he knew if he sang long enough eventually her eyes would grow so heavy that she’d fall right to sleep.

Mac smiles as she watches him sing to her, he frequently sang to both of them and almost always sang in the shower when he was by himself. She adored his voice but adored it even more when he would sing to Charlie. When she was pregnant with Charlie, it was almost a nightly thing for him to sing to her belly. Mac had a feeling when Charlie got older she’d have the same taste in music as Will.

It took about two minutes of singing for Charlie to fall fast asleep, curled up under the covers and tightly holding onto her stuffed Paddington Bear. 

Will smiles at the sight of that and presses a kiss to her light brunette locks before stepping away from the bed and toward the door.

Mackenzie meanwhile steps away from the baby monitor and half a second later, Will appears in the doorway, “I thought you’d be in the shower?” He questions.

She walks over to him and brings both arms around his waist, tilting her head up a little to get a good look at him. “You are the best person I could’ve ever asked for to be the father of my children.”

It takes a second for him to realize that she heard him singing to Charlie, “oh so you heard me?”

Mac nods, “I heard you mention how it was a good thing Charlotte got all of my looks except your eyes which isn’t completely true, she has your ears. Plus, she’s only two and she has already acquired that ‘I wont back down’ McAvoy attitude.”

“Mm..” he squints a bit as he looks down at his wife and thinks for a moment, “I believe that’s McHale trait.”

She rolls her eyes and pushes up onto her tippy toes to give him a kiss. It was quick and when Mac pulls away she says, “let’s just say it comes from both of us then.”

Grabbing his hand, she turns to the bathroom and begins pulling him along with her. 

In the bathroom, Mac flips the light on and goes straight for the shower, turning on the water so that the water will heat up while they’re getting undressed.

Will didn’t even get the chance to attempt taking off his clothes. Her hands swiftly grab his shirt and begin to pull it off of him. She moved in such a way that it was if she owned him. She did in fact own him, he had said it himself and he’d say it again.  _ You own me. _

“I know you’ve had a long and stressful day but do you want to talk about what happened earlier?” He asks which breaks the silence that had formed between them.

His hands moved from unzipping her skirt to pulling off her blouse. Mac’s hands then move to his belt, “well he certainly didn’t make my day all sunshines and rainbows but it wasn’t all bad. Stressful and exhausting, but I got to spend some of it with you and with Charlie and you both make my days so much better.”

Will takes her hands off his pants for a moment, and squeezes both of them, “I’m sorry for lunging at him earlier, probably not my smartest decision considering there could’ve been press anywhere.”

“Yes well, I’ll have Nina Howard on a silver platter if she even thinks about publishing anything if any of her photographers were there.”

A chuckle comes from him at that and he squeezes her hands again, becoming serious for a moment, “I hope you know that I’ve forgiven you Mackenzie if not I’ll spend everyday reminding you.”

A smile comes to her face at that, “I know Billy, you don’t need to prove it to me or say it to me everyday. I don’t think we’d be here if you didn’t forgive me” she brings his hands to her stomach. Her bump wasn’t even that noticeable, which was a good thing when it came to keeping this pregnancy quiet for now. 

He smiles at that, they had gone through a lot trying for a second baby. Neither expected Mac to end up pregnant from the last night they spent together before he went to jail. Nine months later Charlie was born and she was the best thing that had ever happened to them. It only spurred their want for a family further and after months of trying and eventually giving up, both Will and Mackenzie were over the moon when they found out she was pregnant again.

Mac moves her hands again and finishes undressing him, “we’re wasting precious hot water” she points out.

His hands move rapidly to pull her undergarments off of her and a squeak comes from her as he quickly moves to the shower, pulling her in with him. 

Will holds her close in both arms, the water (which was thankfully still warm) pouring down on to both of them. He watches as another one of her beautiful smiles comes to her face, bringing both hands to cup his face, “I love you William Duncan McAvoy and don’t you forget it.” Mac pulls him in for another kiss, pressing her lips hard against his desperately wanting to make that kiss last as long as possible.

**Author's Note:**

> Brian Brenner, still an absolute dick all these years later. Haha, but seriously I enjoyed writing what it would be like to have him see Mac again, happy and married to Will. Thank you to my friend Juju who gave me the idea for that ❤️
> 
> Also quick lil side note: as y’all have probably noticed I upload pretty frequently and hopefully everyone is fine with that lol. I just have so many ideas and once I get a story going in my head I want to write it all at once. I don’t actually do that, but I’m definitely tempted. So hopefully y’all enjoy my weekly uploads as I love writing these two so much. 
> 
> As always, thank you for taking the time to read this. If you feel so inclined, feel free to leave a kudos or some feedback. See y’all soon 💛


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